The paintings of Christian Rex van Minnen would look at home in another dimension, hanging on the walls of a Renaissance palace owned by a wealthy mutant. I imagine myself walking down an ornate hall cluttered with oil paintings of their terrifying ancestors, their bulbous growths and glistening fluids looming over me. His paintings are rife with Western gluttony and luxury, justified by centuries of despotic rule. At the same time, he creates the perfect foil to his rich colors and lustrous oils with his subjects’ erupting skin, all bubbling boils and cancerous lumps, afflicted with the diseases of the poor. Our luxury is consuming itself with pestilence, exposing the ugly reality behind the decadent mask. His subjects are faceless, in that they often don’t have any discernable features, but van Minnen makes their faces from other stuff, piecing together their personality with bumps, folds, pores, tattoos and droplets. You feel their gaze although they have no eyes. It’s kind of awkward, but stunning at the same time; portraits that would suit the house of a collector of curiosities. You can check out some of his paintings below, and I highly recommend following his Instagram if you are into the weird!
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